McGair: Clearing up the mystery behind the R.I. high school baseball playoffs

By editor

Created 05/25/2011 - 14:49

No matter how teams fare on Wednesday, they will return to action on Thursday. Such clarification was learned Wednesday afternoon, just a few hours before the opening round of the double-elimination, four-team regional tournaments were scheduled to get underway.
Here’s how the playoff schedule shakes down from Wednesday until the conclusion of the first round:

Thursday: Winners play at higher seed; loser play at higher seed.

Friday: Team that won 2 games is off. Teams remaining play at higher seed.

Saturday: Team that is undefeated is home team vs. Team with 1 loss.

Sunday (if day): If team with one loss beats team with no losses game with be at team that won on Saturday.

We’ll use Lincoln High to demonstrate how this process works. If Lincoln defeats Cranston East Wednesday, it would then turn around and host the survivor of Cranston East-St. Raphael, the other two teams in the region. A win Thursday would mean the Lions have Friday off and play next on Saturday; a loss means they would be fighting for their postseason lives on Friday.
It may seem a tad confusing, but as we wrote in Wednesday’s edition, the key to smoothly navigating this opening round is to avoid falling into the losers’ bracket on Day 1.